Seven hours and counting left in Jakarta.

I love it no more upon exit than I did upon arrival. It’s been a four day marathon, testing our travel zen, and the first place we’ve ever been that we truly could not find a way to like. Perhaps if we stayed longer… no thanks.

It’s been funny, the Jakarta horror stories have poured in, from people who’ve literally had fecal matter rain down on them, to missionaries who spent 7 years hating it here. That, I truly cannot imagine. The only person to report liking it slept on a bench at the airport because she’d heard it wasn’t worth taking a cab into the city to spend even one night. She reported a spectacular sunrise and an evening spent drinking with the airport staff.

That being said, there were a few things we didn’t hate.

We saw a cool bridge

It was built in the 17th century by the Dutch colonists. We discussed the physics of old school lift bridges. Of course the canal that it spans, part of the crumbling district of Old East Amsterdam, is clogged with refuse and fetid with things we’d rather not contemplate over our cup of tea. “I think they’re not maintaining the old quarters with quite the eye for detail that the Dutch have,” I quipped to Tony. “Indeed,” he smirked, stepping over a dead rat.

The National Museum was pretty good

Of course it was closed on Friday when we first attempted a visit. You’d think after all the time we’ve spent in the Muslim world we’d get a clue that Friday is mosque day. We’re slow learners.

• We got to see the remains of Java Man, that was pretty fantastic.
• We were overwhelmed by the art and detail in the gold work of the old kingdoms
• I studied the Indonesian shadow puppets that I spent a semester reading about and painstakingly reproducing in university with great interest
• The boys thought a double necklace of human teeth was pretty cool
• Hannah photographed a ton of beautiful instruments
• We ate crappy foam cups of noodles for lunch in the canteen
• The children got to hang with a hundred or so of their closest Indonesian school children friends and be photographed like Museum Exhibit A: Traveling Western Children Abroad
• We were interviewed by high school English students

We enjoyed the National Museum. If you come to Jakarta, you should go. Its best features: It’s clean, quiet and no one is smoking.

Have I mentioned the smoking?

You don’t really appreciate what the no smoking laws have done until you’re dropped back into the equivalent of 1965 and you find yourself coughing, choking, and gasping for breath. Of course the smoke has nothing on the other forms of pollution, but I’m not enjoying it, nonetheless.

If you know us at all, you already know that we detest malls. Our reasons for this are many, and I won’t go into it, but suffice to say that we are not “shoppers” at heart and we hate the cathedrals built to that pursuit as a religious experience. So when I tell you that our favourite thing in Jakarta, the place that we have fled to for respite, is a mall, you will have some sense of the depth of our discontent in this city.

I almost feel guilty about the fact that I dislike it here so much that escapism is a reasonable course of action. We’ve forced ourselves to “get out there” and “experience” Jakarta. I’ve, with my most optimistic force, set out each morning to find something I like here… to no avail.

I’m not saying I like the mall… I just don’t dislike it with the same intensity that I do the rest of the city. How’s that for sad commentary?

And so, we’re packed and prepared to move on.

Sulawesi, here we come; with Jakarta as a backdrop, we’re sure to love it!